London Underground
by SGATwin
Summary: [Please tell me if it's the wrong Category!)(A short story about Richard Armitage)On her way back home, a student accidentally meets Richard Armitage. It seems to be the beginning of a good friendship, but a "catastrophy" decides about their future.
1. Chapter 1

I was at the King's Cross Station in London. Although it was late, there were many people at the Underground entrances. Plus, there were problems with the static for some days now which came from old, unused Underground tunnels. They've found them during construction works and didn't know they were existing before that.

Some of them were already located, some of them not, so I felt like I would walk over a field with mines.

To complete the bad things on this day I ran into someone and found myself on the floor. My bag fell to the ground in front of me and some smaller things rolled out of the bag. I cursed quietly, as the one I ran into did.

From the voice I recognized that it was a man. He seemed to have heard my cursing and looked at me.

I identified him as Richard Armitage, what did not really matter to me. I liked him, but he was just a human as everybody else.

I don't know why, but we started to laugh, and after a moment he stood up –still laughing.

"I'm sorry." he said and came a step nearer. I had started to collect my things. Now he helped me.

"I was in thoughts."

"No problem." I replied. "Me too."

He said nothing while we collected the last things.

"Ok, we should have everything now." he said then.

"Yes, we have." I answered and got a bit nervous. "Thank you."

"No problem." he replied and gave me a hand while I stood up. "I'm Richard."

"Amy." I introduced myself and shook his hand.

"A nice name" he said next. "May I invite you to a cup of tea?"

"No need for apologies." I replied a bit embarrassed. He must think that my shirt and jeans could have get dirtier than they were before because we crashed. "Nothing happened and I have to get my tube to the Globe."

"Same direction for me." he replied. "May I go with you?"

"Sure." I said and started to walk. "But you don't have to apologise a hundred times or something like that. Things like this happen every day."

"Do you like the theatre?" he ignored my statement while he followed me and walked beside me after some steps.

"Yes. Why?"

"Because…"


	2. Chapter 2

When I opened my eyes darkness surrounded me. It took a moment until my sight became less blurry, and I recognised a slight pain at the back of my head. I slowly felt that I was lying and that things stabbed my back.

I tried to sit, but my left arm was somehow caught. I heard someone cough far away and the noise of falling stones.

I panicked. I couldn't remember anything after Richard had asked me if I liked to go to the theatre.

Richard. Now I was worried about him, too.

"Help! Can anybody hear me?" I now shouted. "Hel…"

"Amy! Thank god I found you!" I heard Richard say while his face appeared in my sight. I was relieved that he was well, but I also found the wound at his right temple immediately. The dirt in his face was crossed by unnatural shining red blood.

"You are bleeding!" I said. I had calmed down now, but in my ears I sounded still in panic.

"Everything is ok. I am alright." he replied and looked at me shortly. "What about you?"

"Just a small headache." I answered and looked him into the eyes. Just this bright blue in combination with a caring or concerned look made me take a deep breath and calm down again.

"The rocks hurt my back." I sighed and closed my eyes for a second. I recognised something else.

"And my arm hurts."

His eyes went down to my left side. He seemed to ask himself what was wrong with my arm.

"We should get you to your feet and search for a brighter place. After that I will examine your arm."

I wanted to sit up, and Richard took my right arm to help me, but after just a few centimetres I felt a pressure on my arm and told Richard to stop.

"There is something on my arm." I explained. "I can't free it."

Richard looked at me for a split second before he got out of my sight again.

I dared not to turn my head because I was not sure what to expect. I wanted to ass how it looked, but before I could say anything I heard him curse.

Something moved at my arm and shortly after that the pain became stronger, and a few seconds later Richard looked at me again.

"Your arm is stuck under a piece of debris." He explained. "That will hurt."

"Do it." I replied. "I trust you."

Without another word he disappeared again, and just a few seconds later I felt the pressure on my arm getting weaker. It was a liberating feeling, but at the moment when I was hoping that everything would get better, Richard shouted at me through clenched teeth that I had to put my arm out.

Not a second later I heard a crash, and I grabbed my left wrist with my right hand. Now I really felt the pain. Richard was already by my side and pulled me to my feet before he told me to sit down some metres away.

He went hysterically up and down before he to his knew in front of me and lunged for my arm in silence.

"I am not a doctor." He said. "But I think it is broken."

"What (just) happened?"

"I think we found one of the old tube-tunnels." He answered, laid my arm carefully on my tight and sat down beside me.

"What are we going to do now?" I continued asking.

"The only thing we can do is to wait and hope that we were the only ones."

I was silent for some seconds. "Do you think someone will come? For me, it looks like we are imprisoned, as dark as it is here."

"They will come, and if not then we have to search a way to another tunnel." He replied. "You still owe me an answer."

"What? Why?"

"You wanted to go to the Globe and because of that I asked if you like theatre."

"From time to time, if there is time. Actually, I have my 'students-flat' –like my mother used to say- near the Globe."

"What are you studying?" he now asked. I thought to see that he was not asking for interest, but to …. Me. I although answered with the truth.

"Archaeology and Celtic studies with … on medieval Celtic cultures. I want to specify on prehistoric."

"Interesting." He said. "But don't you have holidays now?"

"Normally, but I have a job on an excavation of an early medieval battlefield. In the holidays I work fulltime there."

"A battle field? Really? Things like this still exist?"

Now he seemed to be really interested. His eyes seemed to shine.

"Yes, but outside of the modern city and we go to a meeting point where a car is waiting for us, We don't see where we are driving. This makes it more difficult for treasure hunters or crazy people with metal detectors to plunder the excavation."

"I don't understand how some people have the idea to collect such important cultural goods and sell them for much money illegally!" he said. He seemed to be really angry.

"Do you like museums?" I asked.

"Yes, and I think that we have to change the way we deal with cultural valuable things like books, weapons or pottery."

I was silent again. I saw it like him, but I didn't have to tell him. If you knew that I was working on an excavation, then you knew that culture was important to me. I stared at my hands and realised that we could be down here for hours when I felt the weariness in my bones and my eyes started to get heavy.

"Do you have a watch or something else?"

Richard looked questioning at me for a split second, but then he understood what I meant. He jumped up immediately and searched in his pockets. He was wearing a watch, but it seemed to be damaged through the downfall.

"Unfortunately not, my watch is broken and I left my mobile at home." Was his reply to the question.

"I don't have a watch, but if we find my bag we will find my mobile."

"Do you know where your bag is?"

"Before we fell I had it on my arm, so we should look where you found me."

"I am back immediately."

"Wait!" I replied while Richard already turned away from me. "I'll go with you."

Richard turned around when I wanted to stand up. "No, you stay here. It is too dangerous and your head is hurt. I don't want you to fall and hurt again."

Sulkily I crossed my arms in front of my chest –as far as it was possible with my arm- and sat down again.

It took several minutes in which I just heard some faint rummaging, but Richard was soon back again. He had really found my bag. It was more brown instead of black now and the strap was broken, but besides that everything seemed to be normal. He gave me my bag and sat down beside me.

I immediately rummaged in my bag unerringly. At least I tried, for there were some things sliced. My lunchbox was scattered, as were my sunglasses. My paperback was halfway folded, too. My fingers became cautious fast, and a few second later I found my cell phone.

I took it out and turned it on. There was a strict ban on cell phones at the excavation, so we have to turn it off and give it to our excavation manager before we start working.

I prayed that it would still be working and could almost feel Richard's eyes staring at me.

After endless seconds I had managed it just to found out that I had no connection.

"Damn it!" I said. "I can't call for help. I don't have a connection."

"Amy, we will take care of that later." Richard tried to calm me down. "What time is it?"

"10.30 p.m." I replied and placed it on my thigh before I rubbed my forehead with my unhurt hand. "We are down here for five hours now and not a single sign of a salvage operation."

"No panic." Richard said. "They have to find out if someone fell down. They have to check the CCTV material before they can send someone searching for us."

"And how should they find us?" I now asked more calm. "We are around ten to twenty metres under the ground and buried under at least two metres of debris."

"Don't be such a pessimist!" Richard answered. "We will think of something."


End file.
